Conference rooms in various organizations are booked by one or more users for meetings and teleconferences. Conventionally, booking and scheduling of a conference room in an organization is carried out using Personal Information Managers, such as, but not limited to, a Microsoft Outlook, Infoselect, Meeting Maker etc. Further, a user typically checks availability of conference rooms using a personal information manager application on his personal computer for reserving a conference room for a stipulated day and duration as per requirement.
Generally, the actual duration of meetings cannot be ascertained and hence is not the same as that displayed by the Personal Information Manager. This is because in case of cancellation of meeting, the cancelled status may not be updated in the Personal Information Manager. The conference room may, therefore, be left unutilized and another user may be deprived of using the conference room. In addition, in the event meeting is over before or after scheduled time, the status may not be updated in the Personal Information Manager. In such scenarios, the conference rooms may not be utilized or there may be a conflict between meetings and other users. Moreover, electrical appliances, such as, lights and air-conditioner may be switched on when the conference room is not occupied. The conference rooms are, therefore, not optimally utilized. Further, during the unused time period, electricity in the conference room may be wasted in powering the lights and air conditioning system thereby contributing to unnecessary cost and wastage of electricity.
Conventionally, sensors are used to obtain occupancy status information by monitoring motion or movement in the conference room. The occupancy status information is, then processed and updated in an application server. However, detection of occupancy by, for example, movement or motion sensors may not be accurate. The movement sensors may not be able to detect occupancy when movement in the conference room is limited or nil. Further, acoustic sensors may also fail to detect occupancy in a conference room, if decibel level in the conference room is low. In such scenarios, there is uncertainty in detecting occupancy of the conference room which results in the accuracy level of occupancy detection to be sub-optimal. Further, usage of only image capturing devices, such as, camera, for detecting occupancy of a conference room and updating an application server is computationally complex and expensive.
In light of the abovementioned disadvantages, there is a need for a system and method that can efficiently detect occupancy of multiple conference rooms in real time for optimal conference room management. Also, there is a need for a cost effective system and method that can accurately detect occupancy of a conference room and update an application server with the occupancy status. In addition, there is a need for a system and method that can use combination of various sensors and image and/or video sensors for accurate detection of occupancy status. Further, there is a need of a system and method that facilitates automated switching (on or off) electrical appliances in the conference room based on the occupancy status detection for optimal electricity consumption.